I actually think this was a keep-alive program for Lockheed Martin. In the documentary about this the LM folks talked about how this would pretty much be it for them if they didnt win this. They were not making commercial planes en masse like Boeing.
Could be.
I was involved with the Abrams tank program back in the 70s.
Chrysler clearly had a deficient entry but was picked as winner to help them with their financial problems.
Yup. Military Industrial Complex. It’s been a tremendous waste of resources and some folks have gotten rich.